


Intro: From Darkness to Light

by Emocean



Series: 支柱 — Pillar [1]
Category: Naruto
Genre: Enjoy!, Prologue, chapter one and the rest will be published on FFN!, or bc i'm to attached to the opening sentence dklsf, this one is probs only foreshadowing!!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-05
Updated: 2018-05-05
Packaged: 2019-05-02 11:05:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,089
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14543361
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Emocean/pseuds/Emocean
Summary: Equanimity rose in like the tides. She was a girl—or anonsoulnow, no longer chained to a body, to the nameAshlee, or to the pains of life itself—allured by the illusion of peace, the sensation of tranquility.Slowly, she settled comfortably in the darkness.





	Intro: From Darkness to Light

Ashlee’s last memory was of the feeling of blood rush and the adrenaline of pure terror. There was a flash of pain that struck her like lightning, and she squeezed her eyes shut. Then, there was burning, and burning, and burning.

Ashlee ended then and there.

* * *

 

 

It was dark, but never was it lonely.

Muffled voices echoed from all around, but one voice was the clearest: The voice of a woman. Amidst the gloom, it was as smooth as honey and as warm as a summer day, like a beacon of light.

There was no avoiding it. As time passed, it got clearer. It sang often. Was it an angel? Was it supposed to be a solace for the past?

It didn't serve its purpose very effectively. The foreign language that it spoke in was nostalgic in a way, calling onto feelings of a past joy that invoked a present sadness so deep she felt like drowning.

She was drowning. In what? She didn’t know. Maybe it was in the darkness. Maybe she was drowning in the voice’s song. One couldn’t be sure, but whatever it was, it was killing her. Again.

She stayed there for weeks, maybe months, maybe a full year. Time molded together there so she couldn't tell—but she didn't care.

Why? Because she was dead.

The cause was stupid. It was due to pure negligence. She'd been way too young, her whole life ahead of her burned short.

She wondered how her dad reacted to the news. (Her dad _had_ to have found out by now.) She regretted being born for that. She wondered how her friends would cope. They’d all been close, but now they were without her, and it made her wish they'd never met her. She wondered if her lodgemates survived. There was nothing else to think of that, except— _I'm sorry_.

But no one heard her.

Here she was. She didn’t know whether it was Heaven or Hell but—well, whenever her soul may have been, it was shrouded in what must have been death. There wasn't quite any "peace" to be found here, however. Only constant musing over what should have been, what _could_ have been, what _would_ have been.

And then nothing. And then repeat.

It had frustrated her to be here, at first. At realizing that she was gone. She’d messed up big time. Irrevocably. It'd frustrated her _extremely_.

What would become of her family? Her efforts? Her friends? Her body? Her _self_? What was there to do now?

But that had all settled from the first time she heard _that voice_ sing. It held a certain peaceful aura to it. Smooth and warm, honey and summer, a beacon of light.

Death was rough and it was cold. It was terribly feared and rightfully so, because it was so painful. Life was worth more than all the money or pride that she didn’t have to give, but maybe that’s why death didn’t care. Maybe that’s why it tore her away anyway before she had a chance to find something better to live for.

She could be angry forever—or _try_ to be (which she had)—but was it worth it? What would she gain?

She was gone now. No one was waiting on her anymore. But maybe, just maybe, that meant that she could rest.

The voice seemed to be singing so, at least.

Equanimity rose in like the tides. She was a girl—or anon _soul_ now, no longer chained to a body, to the name _Ashlee_ , or to the pains of life itself—allured by the illusion of peace, the sensation of tranquility.

Slowly, she settled comfortably in the darkness.

There was an implicit aura of warmth by her side, followed by the constant feeling of coolness that fluttered with the humming. She idly waited in the comforting atmosphere for an unannounced turn of events, just like a bird in an egg.

_It's over_ , she thought. She had died and there'd be no going back. _The dead stay dead._

Or the dead were _supposed_ to stay dead—but maybe she was wrong, or her case might’ve been a particularly fucked up one, because, having no bodies and all, the dead also weren’t supposed to feel pain. But that's exactly what she felt.

The walls around her lurched and, instantly, a pressure was just _dying_ to crush her fucking skull— _wait, wait, I have a skull? Do souls have bones?_ She did. And it hurt in a way she'd spent months being unaccustomed to. The pressure was downright excruciating, pinning her arms to her sides and shoving her down, down, down.

Panicking, the anon soul tried to flail desperately. Her movements were sluggish and her arms seemed suspiciously shorter than they should've been.

The walls around her drew closer, tightening from all sides and fighting to push her out like a sausage from casing. She jerked again, feeling something like—a _person_? brushing against her backside, faint tickles of a body rubbing against hers before being pushed much closer by the closing walls, effectively disabling the last of her voluntary movement.

It was scary. She was helpless. _Why couldn’t it all just be over already?_ She tried to jerk up, to kick out, to do _anything_. And she failed, only managing to shift lower.

But even that slight movement cause an agonized groan to echo from all around.

She froze in place like a child in the dark, scared by the sounds outside her window and hoping that maybe, just _maybe_ , it would go away. Forever. Dead or alive, she didn't want to leave the comfort of whatever cavern she was in. She wanted to stay, to sleep, to never feel pain again.

The soul—or  _girl_ , but still not Ashlee—must have jinxed herself or something because the next thing she knew… was air. Pure, fresh, freezing cold air.

Feeling disoriented and scared, she did the only thing she could, even as the pain abruptly ended. The only thing that instinct allowed. She wailed.

She just wanted to stay in the comfort of the calm home she'd come to know. To stay safe from the cold, cruel world. The hardship, the struggles, the pain—she was finally ready to leave it all in the past. To never face it again. To _rest in peace._

But unfortunately, fate had other plans, because when her cries quieted down to whimpers, the next thing she knew was that she was opening her eyes… and they hit the light.


End file.
